Scaredy Nerds Lesson 22 – Don’t Feed the Plants

It has been a while, but time to get back into it. For out first Scaredy Nerds of 2015, we have a film that has been remade into a musical movie and a broadway musical. For as well known as it is, very few people have actually seen the original film. That’s right folks, this week we are watching the Original black and white version of Little Shop of Horrors. It is an amazing film that has been overshadowed by its remake, but that changes today. Of course before we can get to that we need to talk about our last movie, The Village of the Damned.

Village of the DamnedThis 1960’s horror film was truly something special. Continuing the trend of films like Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Village of the Damned examined two big fears of the time, fear of the unknown and the fear of being taken over. The fear of the unknown is pretty straight forward in this film; what are these kids? The Fear of being taken over however was really the goal of this film. Not only was this film exploiting the cold war fears of the Soviet Union secretly taking over the country from the inside. It also hit audiences with the fear of losing control of themselves. The idea of losing control of yourself and literally being trapped in your body is a fear that to this day continues to terrify audiences. With critics everywhere raving about this film it should come as no surprise that Hollywood saw fit to recreate it in 1995, but that film is a joke compared to the original.

This Week’s HomeworkDon’t feed the plants, especially one that has a taste for blood and talks to you. Get ready for the cult classic film Little Shop of Horror’s. This is a film that would eventually spawn one of the greatest campiest musicals of all time. As an added bonus, we get to see a young Jack Nicholson in this film showing us that he was typecast as a crazy SOB from the very beginning.